2009 SUPER GT Round7

Qualifying #1 Weather:Rain | Course:Wet | Air Temp. 17°C | Track Temp. 19°C
SUPER LAP Weather:Rain | Course:Wet | Air Temp. 18°C | Track Temp. 20°C

Duval dominates with consistent control in tricky conditions

The first of the official qualifying sessions began at 12:50. The rain that had been falling lightly before the start grew stronger during the GT500 class portion of the session. It was the No. 32 EPSON NSX driven by Loic Duval that showed a consistently fast pace through these changing conditions and followed up on its morning practice performance by qualifying fastest.
As the rain continued to fall through the Super Lap, the teams were forced to run their time attacks in the rain, but here again Duval in car No. 32 managed to run a fast time. Amidst difficult track conditions that saw the No. 12 IMPUL Calsonic GT-R (Tsugio Matsuda) among other incidents, Duval showed excellent control in running a time of 1 min. 46.111 sec. The second fastest time was run by Ralph Firman in the No. 8 ARTA NSX, just 0.232 sec. behind Duval. This gave Duval his first pole position of the season.
For the EPSON NSX team, this was their first PP since round 9 of the 2006 season here at Fuji. For the driver Duval, this was his second career PP in GT competition. Also, for the NSX teams, this represents their first pole position since round 9 of last year's season here at Fuji.
Although the No. 8 ARTA NSX qualified with the second fastest time, the SUPER GT regulation required that the team's grid position be dropped ten positions due to the fact that the team changed the car's engine after the last round. Thus, No. 8 will start tomorrow's race from 12th position on the grid.
The third fastest time in the Super Lap was run by the ranking leader, the No. 1 MOTUL AUTECH GT-R (Benoit Treluyer). After being unable to compete in the last round due to his accumulation of penalty points, Treluyer returned this round to run the team's time attacks. Despite carrying the heaviest load of handicap weights in class, Treluyer drove with no mistakes and managed to record a 1 min. 46.700 sec. lap in the Super Lap.
The No. 36 PETRONAS TOM'S SC430 (Andre Lotterer), which is presently chasing car No. 1 in the series ranking, was the 4th fastest runner in the Super Lap, thus taking 3rd position of the grid for the race (due to the penalization of No. 8). This will place the 1st and 2nd ranked cars in direct competition with each other in Sunday's race.

No. 88 triple a GALLARDO RG-3

Gallardo wins contest of the European "super cars"

In the GT300 class the pole was won by the No. 88 triple a GALLARDO RG-3 driven by Yuya Sakamoto. In the first two seasons since its 2007 debut in GT racing, the Gallardo failed to show substantial development improvements. But this season it has evolved to the point where it is consistently among the top competitors. This performance today has finally brought the Gallardo its first pole position. It is also the first pole position for driver Yuya Sakamoto. For JLOC, this is their first PP since the one won by Marco Apicella in the No. 88 AKTIO MURCIE RG-1 here at Fuji in round 3 of the 2007 season.
Qualifying 2nd was the No. 81 DAISHIN ADVAN Ferrari (Takayuki Aoki), just missing its second consecutive pole of the series by a margin of just 0.015 sec. However, from 2nd position on the grid, No. 81 is still in good position for a shot at the win in tomorrow's race.
The 3rd-place qualifier was the No. 33 HANKOOK PORSCHE (Masami Kageyama). Despite carrying 80kg of handicap weights in the team's first appearance since round 5 at SUGO and only its third contest of the season, Kageyama managed to drive car No. 33 to the fastest time in the first qualifying session today. In the Super Lap, a slight mistake caused Kageyama to fall short of the times posted by cars No. 88 and No. 81, but he still got the team in third position on the starting grid. From there, they will have a good chance for an amazing third win in three starts this season.
Qualifying 4th was the No. 87 giraffa GALLARDO RG-3 (Hiroyuki Iiri), which meant that all four of the top qualifiers were the European machines often referred to as "super cars" in Japan. The order of those four is Lamborghini, Ferrari, Porsche, Lamborghini.
The ranking leader, the No. 43 ARTA Gairaya (Morio Niita), qualified 6th. The second ranked No. 2 APPLE•K-one•Shiden (Hiroki Katoh) qualified 9th and the third ranked No. 19 WedsSport IS350 (Manabu Orido) qualified 14th, meaning that neither of these two made it to the Super Lap. Among the ranking leaders the No. 46 S Road MOLA Z (Masataka Yanagida) was the fastest qualifier in the Super Lap with 5th place.